Mea Culpa!
Been back in Castelldefels for days and not a finger to the keys! Well, I’ve had a cough; nuff said!
The flight back from Mallorca was not as smooth as it might have been with the inevitable delay which always seems more intolerable when it’s late at night. As the plane was not full a kindly stewardess took pity on my cramped state and ushered me to the limb friendly expanses of the seats by the emergency exits. It was only a pity that the flight was so short – though as a person who likes arriving rather than the process of getting there, no flight can be too short!
We tried to do some preparation for the arrival of Pickfords, scheduled for the third of August by packing plates and cutlery and other odds and ends which would be replaced with far better from the wooden vastness of Pickfords’ stores. You have to have been brought up by my mother to realise fully the unbearable burden of having to eat and drink using substandard dishes, knives and forks and glasses. You may laugh but it is something about which I feel my mother’s shade looking on sorrowfully as I seem to deny all her patient teaching about the important things in life!
The Problem of the Books becomes ever more pressing and its final horror has only been delayed by the fact that Pickfords are not coming until a week after I was led to expect them. IKEA has been searched and there appears to be a possible compromise buying a bookcase with nondescript doors so the books are not visible (don’t ask!) The problem is buying them; transporting them; constructing them and positioning them – before Friday. No pressure then.
We have had our first visitors from Wales: Nicky, Nigel and the girls: we sat on the balcony and enjoyed the view – I shall now assay my first invited guest meal next Tuesday.
We watched Babel after I had mustered my Spanish enough to join the local Video Club. This is a card operated shop where you make your choice on a touch sensitive screen and the selected disc is ejected from the innards of the machine and, when you have viewed the disc you feed the thing back into it.
My first choice of Babel (Director: Alejandro González Iñárrituwith a cast including Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett and Mohamed Akhzam) was not an inspiring one.
This self indulgent, overlong and self congratulatory story of the consequences of a random bullet and the interlocking stories that lead up to and away from the shot fail to convince or grip.
For me the film is summed up by the opening shot of a walking Moroccan; nice enough in its own way but too long and essentially empty.
I started to think about the meaning behind the title but soon discovered that I was being more intellectually rigorous and analytical than the film had any right to expect.
I understand that the film was shot on four different continents (Oooh! Babel, yeah, I see!) and that some of the actors did not meet until the premiere. It shows.
If you want a film of consequences then watch Cage in Andrew Niccol’s Lord of War (2005) for a much more stylish and accomplished piece of work.
I was glad to put Babel back into its sleek plastic case and send it back into the machine.
Tomorrow Carles’ birthday and yet another party in Terrassa – the family party capital of the world!
And I haven’t got him a present!
Been back in Castelldefels for days and not a finger to the keys! Well, I’ve had a cough; nuff said!
The flight back from Mallorca was not as smooth as it might have been with the inevitable delay which always seems more intolerable when it’s late at night. As the plane was not full a kindly stewardess took pity on my cramped state and ushered me to the limb friendly expanses of the seats by the emergency exits. It was only a pity that the flight was so short – though as a person who likes arriving rather than the process of getting there, no flight can be too short!
We tried to do some preparation for the arrival of Pickfords, scheduled for the third of August by packing plates and cutlery and other odds and ends which would be replaced with far better from the wooden vastness of Pickfords’ stores. You have to have been brought up by my mother to realise fully the unbearable burden of having to eat and drink using substandard dishes, knives and forks and glasses. You may laugh but it is something about which I feel my mother’s shade looking on sorrowfully as I seem to deny all her patient teaching about the important things in life!
The Problem of the Books becomes ever more pressing and its final horror has only been delayed by the fact that Pickfords are not coming until a week after I was led to expect them. IKEA has been searched and there appears to be a possible compromise buying a bookcase with nondescript doors so the books are not visible (don’t ask!) The problem is buying them; transporting them; constructing them and positioning them – before Friday. No pressure then.
We have had our first visitors from Wales: Nicky, Nigel and the girls: we sat on the balcony and enjoyed the view – I shall now assay my first invited guest meal next Tuesday.
We watched Babel after I had mustered my Spanish enough to join the local Video Club. This is a card operated shop where you make your choice on a touch sensitive screen and the selected disc is ejected from the innards of the machine and, when you have viewed the disc you feed the thing back into it.
My first choice of Babel (Director: Alejandro González Iñárrituwith a cast including Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett and Mohamed Akhzam) was not an inspiring one.
This self indulgent, overlong and self congratulatory story of the consequences of a random bullet and the interlocking stories that lead up to and away from the shot fail to convince or grip.
For me the film is summed up by the opening shot of a walking Moroccan; nice enough in its own way but too long and essentially empty.
I started to think about the meaning behind the title but soon discovered that I was being more intellectually rigorous and analytical than the film had any right to expect.
I understand that the film was shot on four different continents (Oooh! Babel, yeah, I see!) and that some of the actors did not meet until the premiere. It shows.
If you want a film of consequences then watch Cage in Andrew Niccol’s Lord of War (2005) for a much more stylish and accomplished piece of work.
I was glad to put Babel back into its sleek plastic case and send it back into the machine.
Tomorrow Carles’ birthday and yet another party in Terrassa – the family party capital of the world!
And I haven’t got him a present!
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